Putin Plans Defense, Energy Agreements During Tajikistan Visit

By Ilya Arkhipov -
Oct 3, 2012

Russian President Vladimir Putin will
visit Tajikistan to sign accords on defense cooperation,
migration and energy with the former Soviet state that borders
Afghanistan and China, according to Putin’s foreign policy aide.

The president kicks off his visit tomorrow, with the main
events set for Oct. 5, when his Tajik counterpart, Emomali Rakhmon, celebrates his 60th birthday, Yuri Ushakov, a former
ambassador to the U.S., told reporters in Moscow yesterday.
Putin turns 60 two days later.

Russia wants to shore up its military presence in central
Asia by extending the lease on a Tajik base that terminates in
2014. Tajikistan is a part of the northern supply route used for
about a half of all non-lethal provisions for American troops in
Afghanistan. U.S. forces are scheduled to exit Afghanistan in
2014, which Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned in
June will boost the threat of terrorism and drugs trafficking.

“Tajikistan need this base as much as we do,” Ushakov
said. “This base provides security for the country, taking into
account the future development of the situation in neighboring
regions.”

Tajikistan allows overflights for U.S. aircraft supplying
the NATO-led coalition in Afghanistan. The Tajik government has
also granted permission for ground transit routes that is an
alternative to land routes to Afghanistan that cross volatile
areas of Pakistan from the south.

Kyrgyz Base

Putin’s trip follows his visit last month to neighboring
Kyrgyzstan, the only country in the world to host Russian and
U.S. bases, where he signed an agreement allowing Russia to keep
its facility there for at least 15 more years after 2017.

Last year, then-President Dmitry Medvedev said during his
visit to the Tajik capital, Dushanbe, that an agreement on a 49-
year lease will be signed this spring. Russia’s ground forces
commander, Vladimir Chirkin, told the Ekho Moskvy radio station
last week that there are still “some friction” between the two
countries.

Tajikistan’s economy is heavily reliant on remittances sent
by migrant workers from Russia. Funds sent by more than a
million Tajik laborers, which average about $3 billion, make up
about 50 percent of the country’s economic output.